February 16, 2010

A mere 51 games in...

It's time for my first Bulls-related blog. Let's get to it.

I really, really wanted the Bulls to win the Orlando game, so they would've entered the All-Star break over .500 instead of under, but any chance of that ended when Derrick Rose went down a few minutes in. Instead, the Bulls are sitting at 25-26. Obviously not terrible, but not nearly as good as they could be. So, as usual, I'm not happy. The/My problem? Vinny Del Negro.

The Del Negro supporters -- I'm speaking theoretically of course, as no one could actually support Vinny Del Negro being an NBA head coach -- might point to the development of players like Derrick Rose and Joakim Noah as a sign that Del Negro is at least doing something right. Wrong. Rose and Noah are young, inexperienced players. Even with the worst coaching in the world -- which is perhaps exactly what they are getting -- they would improve. Instead, we should look at the young players who have definitely not improved under Del Negro's watch. Namely Tyrus Thomas and Aaron Gray. If half of your younguns are regressing during your tenure, I'm going to say you might not be doing a good job.

But the crappiness of Del Negro's job-doing goes far beyond the development of his players. There's the lack of any sort of identifiable offensive structure, his inability to diagram even a single decent play, and best of all, his knack for minimizing the talent on his roster.

So is he a good coach? Let's look at the two biggest reasons reasons why Vinny Del Negro should have been fired by now:

1. Dec. 8: New Jersey 103, Bulls 101
Coming into this game, the New Jersey Nets were 1-19, good for a .050 winning percentage. In theory, that means they were 10 times worse than a .500 team, which is exactly what the Bulls would be had they NOT LOST TO THE NEW JERSEY FREAKING NETS AT HOME. It remains the Nets only road win; they are 1-27 away from the Meadowlands or wherever the fuck they play. Not that they're much better there, as they have a total of just four wins (against 48 losses) all year. Losses don't get much worse than this. Of course...

2. Dec. 21: Sacramento 102, Bulls 98
This was quite possibly the worst regular-season Bulls' loss of my lifetime; of course, back when the Bulls were good, I didn't give two shits about the regular season. Anyway, they blew a 35-point second half lead, getting outscored 58-19 over the final 21 minutes. That's not a typo, 58-19; being pounded at that rate over the course of an entire game would result in a 134-44 loss. To the Sacramento Kings (current winning percentage: .346), no less.

Because it was the first game of a back-to-back, I suppose it's understandable that Del Negro wasn't canned during his post-game press conference. However, after they also dropped the next game (88-81 to the Knicks) -- and given that they had three days off in a row following that -- he definitely should've been fired at that point.

The Bulls were then 10-17. They had lost 13 of 17, including a number of embarrassing blowouts (110-78 to Toronto, 118-83 to Portland, and 106-80 to Boston, among others). In fact, over those 17 games, the Bulls had a -10.8 point differential; to put that in perspective, for the season only Minnesota (-8.5) and New Jersey (-11.7) have differentials worse than minus-5. It was the perfect time to ax the coach. But they never did.

Hold on a second, Mr. SKIA, you say, the last of those games happened almost two months ago! It's true: the Bulls have played better ever since, going 15-9. So has Del Negro stumbled onto some magical formula? Nope. He just got Tyrus Thomas back.

Which is ironic, because Del Negro is so incompetent that he doesn't realize that Thomas is one of his best players.

Don't scoff. What stat would you like to use? By John Hollinger's PER (player efficiency rating, which basically distills all of a players rate stats into a single number), Thomas is the Bulls' fourth-best player with a mark of 16.42, trailing only Noah (17.62), Rose (17.32) and Luol Deng (16.90). But given how inconsistent Thomas' minutes are, the difference between him and Noah -- or any of the others he trails -- is rather insignificant. Meanwhile, the gap between Thomas and the fifth-best player (John Salmons, 12.74) is huge -- at 3.68, it's greater than the differential between Kobe Bryant (23.14) and Joe Johnson (19.55).

According to 82games.com, Thomas' +5.3 net production (which compares a player to the guy he's opposing) is the second-best on the team, trailing only Deng's +5.8. Among those with significant minutes, he also is tied for second (again behind Deng) in on court/off court plus-minus, at +3.1. Speaking of the team's performance, before Thomas broke his arm, the Bulls were 3-2; since he's come back, they're the aforementioned 15-9. That's good for a record of 18-11 when he plays, which I believe compares favorably to the Bulls' 7-15 mark in his absence.

But if those stats are too team-oriented or new-fangled for your old-fashioned rectum, consider this: Among players with at least 500 minutes, Thomas is seventh in the entire league in blocks per minute, with 3.37 per 48 minutes. Meanwhile, he's a shocking fifth in steals, with 2.68 per 48.

Just reflect on that for a moment. He is in the top-10 in both steals and blocks per minute. And the guy can't get on the freaking court because of Taj Gibson? This is a joke, right? Thomas is the only player in the top-20 in both categories, and no one else is really all that close. In fact, only two other players are even in the top-40 in both categories: Josh Smith is 26th in steals and 20th in blocks and Marcus Camby is 35th and 19th, respectively. Incidentally, both of those guys' coaches -- yes, even the since-deposed Mike Dunleavy, sort of a rich man's Vinny Del Negro -- know enough to give them significant minutes. But Del Negro prefers to keep one of the league's premier defensive game-changers on the bench.

Look, this isn't meant as a knock on Gibson, someone I was not shy about criticizing post-draft, but who's admittedly been much better than I thought (though still not nearly as good as this guy). Still, let's compare Thomas with the guy he just can't wrest a starting job from:


Tyrus Taj
Min./G 23.2 24.6
Points 8.8 8
FG% 47.4 47.2
FGA/G 7.1 7.1
FT% 64.7 61.9
FTA/G 3.1 2.1
Rebounds 6.3 6.4
Assists 1.1 0.7
Steals 1.3 0.6
Blocks 1.6 1.1
TO 1.8 1.3
Fouls 2.2 3.4

The main knock on Thomas is that he plays out of control and takes crazy shots, and yet he actually shoots for a (slightly) higher percentage than Gibson. Sure Thomas' somewhat, um, undisciplined tendencies are apparent in his turnovers, which are 0.5 higher per game than Gibson's, but this is more than mitigated by his ability to avoid fouling, a nuance Gibson has yet to learn.

All of it together means Thomas' PER is nearly four points higher than Gibson's mark of 12.50. It's completely vexing that Gibson retains a job that Thomas only lost due to injury. So what the hell is going on here?

First off, Del Negro clearly doesn't like Thomas, and just as clearly, the feeling is mutual. But this runs deeper than that. I used to think that Vinny only liked veterans, but that can't be it since Gibson -- although more than a year older than Thomas -- is just a rookie. So it's something else, and I think I've put my finger on it. Like most dullards, Vinny likes certainty. He'd rather take Gibson's sure, middling production than Thomas' higher-ceiling/inconsistency. Which would be understandable, if the Bulls were actually a contender for the title. But the Bulls need stars, and Thomas still has a chance to be one. Gibson does not.

Again, this isn't to criticize Taj. He's proven to be a decent rotation player, someone that could be a big man off the bench for a legitimate playoff team. Even though DeJuan Blair's been the far superior player -- his overall numbers are similar to Gibson's, but he's piled them up playing far fewer minutes for a much better team, plus he's four years younger -- given Gibson's more-certain health it's at least somewhat defensible. But the thing is, this isn't an either/or; the Bulls could've had both Gibson and Blair. But instead of taking Blair, as some people championed, they opted for James Johnson. If only someone would've known that this was a terrible idea.

Johnson's gotten limited minutes, but he's yet to do anything to justify getting more. He's shooting just .382 from the field, and despite being 6-8, 250 is averaging just 8.3 rebounds per 48 minutes, a figure topped this season by legendary bangers like Carlos Delfino, Corey Maggette, Mike Miller, and Vladimir Radmanovic. Meanwhile, Blair grabs 17 rebounds per 48 minutes, a rate that not only more than doubles Johnson's, but also ranks fifth among all qualified players. Incidentally, Blair's PER (17.81, second-best among rookies, behind Tyreke Evans' 18.80) also is more than twice that of Johnson (7.20).

Of course, I can't blame Vinny for not taking Blair. However, even if the Bulls had DeJuan Blair, I doubt that Del Negro would figure out that he should play him. Because knowing which players are good is just not one of Vinny Del Negro's strong suits.

And that's not to imply that he has any.

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